


For Charity

by charmquark



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-26
Updated: 2014-09-26
Packaged: 2018-02-17 11:18:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2307698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charmquark/pseuds/charmquark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I told you all I wouldn’t ever let my comrades go on horrible dates, didn’t I?” Sakura makes a sacrifice for the village, and Kakashi helps her out. ( platonic KakaSaku )</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Charity

**Author's Note:**

> From a request on tumblr.

It was for a good cause, Tsunade said. The war, short as it was, had resulted in heavy losses: property, lives, whole villages. There were a lot of war orphans, Tsunade said, which Sakura didn’t need to be told. She only needed to look at Ino to feel the press of irrational guilt that both her parents are still alive, while so many of her friends are lucky if they’ve even got one left.

Sakura knows these things, which is the only reason she goes along with this ridiculous farce in the first place. Tsunade tells her to suck it up and that’s the point where she becomes convinced that her meddling old yenta of a mentor is mostly doing this — putting her own student up for auction, that is — for her own sadistic amusement.

She resolves then and there to replace all Tsunade’s good sake with the kind she hates.

It’s largely an innocent affair, really. It’s part of the month-long international festival celebrating the end of the Fourth Shinobi War (never let it be said that ninja did anything by halves) and meant to promote good relations within an alliance between villages that was born of necessity, and still in its infancy. Still tottering on unsteady legs. The money was all going towards good causes and Sakura’s a girl with a strong sense of duty not only to her friends and to her village, but to her fellow human. She became a medic to help people, right? What harm could one date do? It’s not like she was being married off for the sake of inter-village relations or something archaic and stupid like that.

Doesn’t prevent her from grumping about it, though. The fact that it’s a silent auction — her name on a paper alongside others, male and female ninja alike, with blank lines for bids underneath — and that she’s not being paraded around and shouted at like a horse on the market is only a small mercy now that she’s seen some of the names on that list.

Sakura huffs, throwing herself down on a bench without a care for wrinkling her pretty new yukata. It’s supposed to be a celebration, but she isn’t feeling all that festive at that particular moment.

“Why the long face, Sakura?”

She starts, twisting around to see Kakashi, whom she hadn’t sensed behind the bench. Hokage’s apprentice and war hero or not, he can sneak up on her as effortlessly as usual, it seems.

“Don’t you own any other clothing, Sensei?” she retorts, commenting on the fact that he clearly hasn’t made any effort to dress up. He’s still in his Jonin uniform.

“Since when did you start deflecting questions with questions?”

“Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

“Of course.” Sakura can’t help but snort.

“Fine. It’s the date auction.”

“Ah.” Kakashi nods, as if this explains everything. “What about it?”

“Aside from the obvious?” He says nothing, obviously waiting for her to go on because he knows she has more to say. “Lee-san keeps coming back to out-bid everyone else.”

“Are you supposed to be looking at that?” He asks, obviously knowing that she isn’t. Sakura merely arches an eyebrow, as if to say,  _Yes, and?_  It’s like he doesn’t know her better. He lets out a beleaguered, obviously put-upon sigh as though he isn’t well aware of her impertinence. “Well, it’s all for charity, isn’t it?”

Sure, it is, but that doesn’t mean she can’t look mulish about it. “I don’t exactly relish the idea of an entire evening with Rock Lee, that’s all. Although I guess I should be grateful. I think that one ninja from Cloud who wrote me a four-page love letter bid 1000 ryo.”

Now, it was difficult to tell, what with the mask, but she could have sworn the way his brow pinched together at this meant he was frowning. It was impossible to be sure, and anyway, it was gone in the next instant. “Maa, I guess Sakura-chan is too pretty for her own good.”

Before she can even begin to react to that, he’s ruffling her hair — messing up her hair! that Ino spent half an hour on! — and she’s swatting at his hand, the bizarre compliment all but forgotten. “Kakashi- _sensei —!_ ” she squawks.

He pulls his hand away swiftly, and very wisely takes himself out of striking range before she can break anything. “I wouldn’t worry about it. It isn’t serious. This is supposed to be a party, you should go have fun.” Just like that, he’s continuing down the street in his usual slouching manner. She knows he’s right, which is why she allows herself only a few more minutes of concentrated sulking before she rights her hair a little and sets off in search of her friends.

* * *

She deliberately puts the whole thing from her mind, at least until Tsunade finds her later, an hour after the auction was supposed to close. The woman’s drunk as a skunk and obviously pleased with herself, like she’s got some excellent secret hidden up her sleeve. Sakura is immediately wary.

The auction was an enormous success, apparently. They raised several hundred thousand ryo that day, and Sakura herself raised 10,000 ryo (the girl chokes on her dango when she hears this). The Hokage laughs, slapping her student on the back when she coughs and nearly cracking a rib.

“ _Who?_ ” Sakura demands, tears that have nothing to do with humor in her eyes, unlike the evil woman responsible for all this.

“I have to say, I had money on one of your overprotective teammates bailing you out, but I thought it’d be Naruto. Hatake cost me that bar tab.” But she doesn’t look upset about it at all.

Sakura nearly chokes again, this time on nothing at all, and with the way Tsunade looks like she’s going to bust her gut laughing it’s clear why she’s not angry with Kakashi.

That doesn’t mean Sakura can’t be.

* * *

It doesn’t take her all that long to track him down; or at least, for him to let her find him. She gets the impression that it’s much more his willingness to be caught than her own sneaking ability, because he takes her punch on the arm and she knows as well as anyone that the man never lets himself be blindsided by a malicious attack. And Sakura is feeling fairly malicious right now, if she’s honest.

“You! Why did you do that?!” she demands, silently prepared for him to say  _Do what?_  at which point she will actually strangle him.

But he doesn’t. He smiles, instead: she can tell because his one eye creases even as he rubs his abused arm. “I told you all I wouldn’t ever let my comrades go on horrible dates, didn’t I?”

—  _what._

“ _No,_  you said you’d never let your comrades die.” What a ridiculous man.

“Close enough.”

“A bad date isn’t the same thing at all.”

“You wouldn’t know, with the way you were complaining earlier.”

“Hey!” But she isn’t even mad anymore. Somehow, he’s turned it all around, and she’s laughing. “Are you saying you’d do the same for Sasuke-kun?”

“Hm.” Kakashi scratches his chin. “Probably not,” he admits.

“So much for favoritism.”

“Who says I’m not playing favorites?” Something in the way he asks this — or perhaps in the way he looks at her, like it’s a serious question (how could she possibly be his favorite? He’s  _never_  paid attention to her like he has the boys. But he has looked out for her, even if he wasn’t always around. He wasn’t a great teacher but he has been there to pull her out of dangerous or, in this case, simply annoying situations) makes her blush, and she can’t answer.

“But, ah, you’ll have to pay, I’m afraid. I spent all my money on the auction…”

This time, he has the sense to actually duck when Sakura takes a swing at his head.


End file.
